damagedgoodes

Well guys after a bit over a year of putting my P-40 together I took it out for it's maiden last week. It didn't go so well and was over in about 10 seconds. A combination of errors all lined up at the right time to see her lift off at too low an airspeed , climb near verticle then roll over in a stall into a nose dive. It smashed the front off the fuselage off and did some damage right throughout the airframe. It is repairable with a lot of work and one day I'll get around to it so I can have another crack at flying it. Oh well it's all experience and as dihartened as I am it's a reminder to me that you need to have your A game on with heavy warbirds. For those interested mods included stripping all covering off, filling in the open bay structure, glassing and panel lines with rivets. The rudder and elevators were re built to a more scale outline, counter balances and trim tabs were fitted to the rudder and hori stab, functioning tail wheel doors with robart retract, Sierra main gear, Ziroli gear pods. DA 60 and Ziroli spinner. Rawley Aviation exhaust stubs. Ty's cockpit, Topflite P40 front half of canopy and sliding canopy. Warbird colours for paint and hand cut stencils. Finished dry weight 30 lbs.
This was a test for me to see what I could do to an existing ARF. It was my first glassing and painting job. Thanks to all you guys here on RCU for the tips I've picked up along the way learning these facetts of modelling. In particular members like Invertmast as without his Youtube how to fibreglass videos I'd still be scratching my head. Thanks Stoat for your reply's and whilst I think I stuffed my C of G measurement your emails helped a lot. Hope you like the pics and on to the next project. Cheers,
Dave

Brad330l

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Dave that is horrible news. I really feel for you mate, you can see straight away it was a beaudy with a lot of talent mixed in.

I hate losing models.[&o]

Brad

stoat

Dave, that REALLY sux! I know how you feel as I crashed my Tigercat on its maiden. Also dorked one of the P40's on landing and cartwheeled it. Both of these are on youtube if it makes you feel any better watching someone else bollox it up

Put it asside and have a couple of weeks without looking at it, then have a good poke around. It wont ba as bad as you think. All the good P40's have been crashed at least once. Hell, we were flying 2 up on sunday and one stalled after a motor cut and landed in a tree and this was with a very experienced pilot. A real shame as I was flying the other one and having a ball chasing him around!

Chin up old chum! Its a crappy thing to have happen, but we have all done it - sort of a right of passage Wellcome to Fat Boy Flying Squadron!

G T

on ya mate

i didnt know if you would have passed the info on in this formate mate

the images dont do any justice to what the end result really looked like in person
the vid and the images i took will be on there way with your other stuff today

good to hear that the jet was in the sky yesterday, get some air time on that and hang the P40 up for a while , or the missus is going to kill you..

jmohn

Sorry to hear about your crash. It is one of the more challenging warbirds to fly for sure. The P-40 is a great looking plane, but has a bad tip stall. I haven't flown mine a while as I have been too busy, but will try and get her back up soon.



Jeff

verbails

Dave
That news sucks! We have a saying in our club that it is a cruel sport little satifaction I know but you are of course not the first person to have a maiden go wrong! And I bet that there will be plenty more! We have had two in as many weeks. Time heals most pain,if that doesn't work my friend Jim Beam may help ! Hope it works out for the better !

Regards Chris

damagedgoodes

Thanks for the kind words guy's, the P-40 will live again, just ordered some 2oz cloth to start repairs. I'll post repair pics in this thread in a few weeks when I begin. Cheers,
Dave (really with damagedgoodes now...)

DjBac

For anyone in need I have a Brand new set of ESM Air Retracts for the P-40. Changing my project, so I don't need them!

marretta87

hay guys was wondering if any 1 can help me with my p 40. i am going to use a dj80cc in my girl but not sure what size 3 blade prop i should use so if any 1 can help would be much appreciated

stoat

The manufacturer doesnt recomend a size? I would guess at a 23x12 or around that size. Usuall for a 3 blader you take the 2 blade size and go one size down in diameter and one size up in pitch. i.e. a 24x10 will become a 23x12.
Cheers
Brett

marretta87

yer will try that thanks mate.

oh and any 1 out there with this modle do any needed mod to this plane

stoat

Have a good read of this thread. Check you're wings are the same incidence. Add a gyro. Mod the u/c

marretta87

wot do you mean by gyro????

flypilot

Just started building mine and are looking to find a set of the electric retracts for this bird but all seem to be out, does anyone know where I can source a set where they can send internationally.?
Also the spinner look to be hard to find as well..

kwik

ESM P-40 in action;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?featur...&v=_cRjNUPAZqU

stoat

A gyro on the rudder will help with takeoffs. These planes swing like a b@#ch on takeoff if you don't catch it early.

flypilot

Jepp, that would be mine....flew great and was a "kittycat" on landings with full flaps...
Only problem that surfaced was one that was expected, and that was the v2 gearbox stripping. V3 gearbox is hopefully soon available.

stoat

Nice vid qwik!

kwik

Thank you Stoat ! I will send it further on to the Cameraman ! Flypilot was the pilot, and he did a great job.
It looks simple, but it isn't. Neither is it simple to put such an ARF up in the air. It is only simple when you know what you are doing.

There is a lot of complaining on ESM kits.

I think the complaints mostly comes from people that is used to ARF's like Extra's and YAK's and similar.

And when they see these gorgeous warbirds, with all the history behind them, they too wants to enjoy them.
I don't blame them.

And therein lies the problem.

The die hard warbird fans did'nt go that route. They buildt warbirds themselves from short kits or from scratch.

And chrashed, rebuildt, crashed, and so on. It is a difficult hobby, but that's why we like it. It gives the male brain challenges,
which it thrives on. Center of gravity, weight, radio equipment, oil, fuel,petrol, engines,....lots of interesting "problems".

We got used to the fact that spinners, gear and engines, short kits, drawings, you name it, was hard to get, made by dedicated
warbird fans in small one-man business'es. With a family life and another daytime job. Maybe we had to wait 6 months for the parts.
But we got the nice wheel, or the spinner, finally, and was over-joy'ed. A Sist wheel for a Focke Wulf is like a jewel to us.

But now, the " Instant satisfaction" syndrome is here.

So it was nice to see a video of yet another ESM Warbird success. Additionally to the 109, the Fw 190, the Typhoon, the Corsair, the Hellcat,
the Mustang, the P-47, and so on. Not just a P-47 and a Mustang.

But they are not like an ARF Extra, where hundreds of people put the same engine in them, and fly. Nothing wrong with that,
but it is a different story.

stoat

So true! I am a fairly vocal critic of ESM warbirds, not because I feel ripped off or expect them to be an "out of the box" ARF, but because I feel they could do so much better for such a small extra effort. Dont get me wrong, I love the ESM birds, and have built almost all of them now (3 of these P-40's to date) and my favorite plane at the moment is my 50cc ESM Corsair (you know the one Kwik :-).
So, yes, these are not and ARF, but more like a half kit. The airframe is complete but it will still require a large amount of enegeering and problem solving to get done. At the end of the project it will be a better plane as it will have more "you" in the build, so a greater sence of satisfaction! However if you are looking for a "shake the box" warbird that will build in a week, then buy a Hanger 9 or Kyosho etc.

Cheers
Brett

dgiatr

please can anybody tell me whats the total weight of the model ready to fly;
thanks!

lrb75

My Feedback: (12)

I think mine weighs about 25 lbs with a rimfire 50cc and 10s 6000mah batteries.

dgiatr

ok thank you very much !
.......is that thread dead or am i missing something...;

vasek

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post deleted, my bad

nemesis4u

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I HAVE a NEW IN BOX ESM P-40 CANOPY 3 PIECE SET IF ANYONE IS NEEDING ONE... JUST EMAIL ME

[email protected]

CHEERS!

TOMAS
VQ WARBIRDS
"KEEP 'EM FLYING"

www.vqwarbirds.com